The Dream of the Woman's Tongue
by Urksongs
Summary: The historical voice of women explored through a dream narrative. Influences: Ovid, Chaucer, Alcott, etc. Cameos form Philomela, Arachne, as well as 19th century women writers: ZitkalaSa, Harriet Jacobs.


Severtson: 7

**The Dream of the Woman's Tongue**

**Part One**

There is a thick forest some miles from my home, and within it a vast and calm pool. It is said that there are no fish in the quiet lake, but I was feeling drawn to drag my little plastic rowboat between the cedars to float about and try my hand at fishing anyway. It was a beautiful day, and there was no one in the forest; let alone on this secret water. Once shoved off from the shore, I tied on a fly and heard strange birds. The sweet smell of cedar and unknown wildflowers filled my senses. In order to relish in the peace I nestled into the most comfortable position my trusty craft allows. This safe pool seemed somehow unaffected by the outside world, even inertia failed to rest my boat, it drifted slowly with an equal force as I had exerted shoving off. My fly-line fell limp upon the face of the water and carved out a slow 'V'. Senses overwhelmed, I closed my eyes.

Some time later I awoke, leisurely adrift. As I sat up I became aware that the tall trees were gone; I seemed to have drifted far around a bend, to a part of the pool embanked by a meadow. Saplings sprouted here and there in the field, and not far from shore there was a plum tree. I couldn't believe my eyes at first, but there underneath that tree sat a young woman, a goddess perhaps? She looked Native American, with thick jet black hair flowing, dark skin and dress. She sat upon the roots and seemed to be working with her hands; the detail must have been painfully intricate, for she didn't hear my hull run ashore upon gravel, or my footfalls as I approached her. With each 'crunch' I began to step louder, as to announce my presence. Yet she worked away.

"Hello," I said.

"I am telling a story," she said. I wasn't sure what she meant, but she didn't sound frightened or bothered by my presence. I came closer to her yet and could see that she was sewing beads onto a moccasin. "This is you," she said pointing at a small picture woven into the buckskin. I bent over and she held it up to my eyes. There, in thousands of little beads was my face looking back up at me! It was an incredibly detailed picture of me looking at the moccasin, with the pool beyond me. It was practically a mirror!

"H-How?" I stuttered and recoiled.

"I put you into the story so you could see what happens under different suns." Her eyes were sad, but her voice sounded like water; soothing.

I imagined she was an Undine, some naiad, or some otherworldly character—such power! But I quickly recalled how badly things turned out for prideful knights who dishonored such entities, often offending by accident, and feared, for I was no knight. All manner of thoughts ran through my head, these old stories might be true! It is easy to offend where you are out of your element.

What did she mean? Put me in the story? Different suns? I thought over her cryptic words. I pondered the meaning of seeing myself in her beadwork; it must have taken days to sew, and yet I had only just arrived. But as is the case in such situations, reason has no home in the head. I resigned to snap out of it and partake in the unfolding of my fate, despite confusion.

"What do you mean?" was all I could manage to state.

"There is a bead for every color. There is a bead for every sound, every emotion, every fear, and every joy. Once my beads were stolen from me, and I had to find other beads. But I have returned, and though the beads do not look the same, I can finally use them again. See with what ease, look, you are here," and she pointed to me, then to the moccasin, "now, you are here."

As I gazed again at her masterful work the beads moved, and for a moment I felt like I was in two places at once—under that plum tree and in the beads under that plum tree. Then I was in the beads. They reorganized themselves until my surrounding was new.

**Part Two**

Now I was in a huge room. There was a fireplace big enough to burn a forest in, and oil paintings up and down and all across two walls, elaborate tapestries and drapes on the others. Every item was ornately fashioned, everything fancily carved, patterned or otherwise complicated. Even the large woman in the large chair went unnoticed by me until she spoke. She was as big as an ox, and pale as beluga. She wore what must take longer to put on and take off than one wears. I hadn't noticed her any sooner than any other over embellished possession that was present.

She said, "don't muddy the rug, that'll cost more than you're worth, young man, now what business have you here?" Her voice was like that of a goose who couldn't sing, one who none of the other geese were bold enough to tell.

"I, I uh…" I was at a loss for words.

"Master Carson is out at the moment. You know him, he is dark and somber, with features graceful yet quietly bold. He is a handsome man, with all the glow of a youth spent relishing its splendor. From his chin you can tell that he has an inherent calling to power, prestige and esteemed leadership; a testament to his ilk, the benchmark of masculinity. His face wears a mask, the look of one who is intent on applying some trusty bit of reason to disarm the most perplexing paradox, yet his stature is enduring confidence, his action is swift and precise—he is Carson. You're here to pick up the drapes for cleaning, aren't you?" And she pointed to two sets of neatly folded up drapes that I hadn't noticed.

"Um, yes, that's it, I'll just be on my way." I wanted out of the room, and for all my bewilderment it seemed the quickest solution. I picked them up and scurried out the door. As I was leaving I think I heard her quote something from the Bible to herself. It was bright outside, and in my haste I hardly noticed that I was escorted into a horse drawn carriage. I sat down with the drapes in my lap and the coach was off. The wooden wheels rattled across cobblestone and I looked down at the drapes.

There, on top of the neatly folded drapes was a spider, all belly. She was looking up at me and in a little distant voice said, "I'm moving."

This was my first encounter with a talking spider, but as the day had been going it seemed acceptable. "Where to?" I asked.

"Wherever you take me, I suppose." was her reply. It seemed a sensible response.

"Where would you like me to take you?" I inquired.

"Doesn't matter. But that last place was no good. Carson used to holler whenever he saw one of my daughters; he'd squash my little babies as soon as he saw them. But since he died the old maid just sits and sews. She was one of his fancy things."

"She said he was… out, is she in denial of his death?" I said.

"I don't know what she thinks, all I know is Carson used to be real particular about how things were in that house, and even after he left things stayed the same."

"What's your name?" I asked.

"Arachne. Have you heard of me? I was the best weaver, thanks to Athena. The old maid you saw at the house weaves and sews all day, but if only she'd have seen my work she'd learn a thing or two."

"Arachne, yes, you competed with the God of crafts, and were changed to a spider." I knew I was familiar with a famous spider, and was proud to recall her story. I had her all figured out.

"Yes, but not because I lost," she said quickly.

"I've heard of you, yes, I think you're lucky anyway. A nasty business that is, challenging Gods." I said.

"I am _not_ lucky! I have been apologizing for thousands of years! I know now that a pupil can out perform their master, and still owe the credit to the teacher. I was wrong to credit myself with all the work." She paused. I knew that in the story I had read, it seemed her work _was_ better than Athena's, but that her punishment came from her inability to give credit where credit was due.

She sighed, and then Arachne said, "Long before my day, shortly after the birth of man there was a golden age. And men as well as women were free. Perhaps one day they both will be again, but all I had was my loom through which to speak, and now I am destined to weave nonsense!"

I thought about consoling her with the news that there would one day be a spider named Charlotte that figures out how to weave words, but thought that it would be too little too late. I looked out the window. The conversation had reached awkward silence. I think Arachne was looking out the other window. I was thinking about bacon.

Before I could realize that though she couldn't weave meaning anymore that she could still _talk_ she was gone! I supposed that she had gotten to wherever it was she wanted to go, and had hopped out the window. The horses stopped. I got up and left the giantess' drapes behind in the coach. I wasn't really planning on washing them. I felt bad for a moment—I knew how concerned she was with the maintenance of belongings, but I got over it quickly.

**Part Three**

I was in a dark wooded area; between thick tree trunks I could see rolling fields of cotton. There was a little cabin before me. The carriage was pulled away; though I couldn't see a driver I heard the cracking of a whip. I approached the cabin from what seemed to be the back, for there was no window or door. I walked around it, and found the same was true on all sides. What a terrible design, I thought. I hoped there wasn't a starved carpenter on the inside that had not realized the error in his plan until it was too late. I almost chuckled at the thought of a skeleton with a hammer, but it wasn't funny.

I heard footsteps. A woman emerged from the brush. She was a thin old black woman. She looked like a slave of recent American history. She was walking quietly and looking down at the ground, but she knew I was there. She had a bag, over filling with freshly picked cotton, cotton that was splattered here and there with drops of what could only be blood. In her left hand was two letters. She came fairly close and gestured to the cabin.

"That's Philomela's cabin," she said. "Her own brother-in-law put her in there."

I was shocked to learn that there was a woman in there. "Is there a way out?" I had to ask.

"Yes, but I don't know what will happen if you let her out. But the master made a secret door—the fool wanted a way back in, he keeps going in. Look here." She pointed. We approached the side, and sure enough, there was a way in. It was bolted, locked and tricky to jostle, and hard to see, but eventually I got the 'door' open, but I wasn't thinking about what I was going to find.

When I swung open the hinged panel a blast of doves shot out of the darkness. Though their wings made no sound I was frightened, and noticed that their feathers, as they waltzed to the dirt, were all splattered with blood. I looked to the floor of the hovel, and there amid a blanket of crimson splattered feathers writhed a bleeding serpent, or at least the stubby segment of one. It rolled and twisted, pulsed and throbbed and seemed to be working its way to a wooden chair upon which lay a beautiful maiden. But she looked grim, pale and as if she had lost even the will to cry.

"You are free!" I said. My enthusiasm did nothing. "Who did this to you?"

She gestured to the opposite wall. There was a tapestry above a loom. She had been busy in her prison it seemed. There was a story right there on the wall. A ship, a marriage, a sister oversea, the king retrieves the sister, wait! This is the sister! He has locked her away and completely overpowered her in everyway. The tapestry shows what the cruel man has done to his sister-in-law. And that bloody serpent is … her tongue! He has taken it from her, so her story cannot be told.

"Come, we must get this tapestry to your sister!" I said, trying to help. But she didn't stir. It seemed the pain was too fresh.

The black woman said, "this happened in a Shakespeare play once. The girl was so rash she told her rapist that she was going to tell everyone what he did, so he chopped off her tongue, but Shakespeare's villain took her hands too. She still managed to draw with her stumps and a stick in the sand. You can't tell a woman she can't say nothing, she's going to say it one way or another."

Just then a swan-driven chariot alit, upon which sat who I knew to be a Goddess, so perfect was her beauty. She had golden flowing hair and piercing grey eyes.

"I am Athena, I am Minerva, I am the God of arts and crafts, born from my father's brow. I come to give back Philomela's tongue." And one last bird flew out of Philomela's cabin, a nightingale, singing sweet song, and Philomela was gone.

But then I awoke with the tug of the line. There was a fish biting! The dream was only a vague memory as I reeled in the surprise. I love fishing, because you never know what you've caught until you get it to the boat. But after reeling, I realized that the tug on the line came from dead weight, I had been drifting and simply snagged on something, a stick or aquatic plant-life. But no, it was an old shoe!

_fin_


End file.
